Quartz and Flake Broadcast Flooring
Broadcast flooring is the finish that gives you slip resistance, hides wear, and still takes abuse. A resin body goes down wet, colored quartz or vinyl flake is broadcast into it to rejection, and a polyaspartic topcoat locks the aggregate in place. One system, many looks — the same build that survives a hot-washdown dish area also finishes a lobby corridor. Maverick manufactures the MavTop line and installs it with in-house crews across Michigan, Ohio, and the Midwest.
Three Layers, and the Middle One Does the Work
Every broadcast floor is built the same way, and every failure we get called to fix traces back to a shortcut in one of these three steps. Understanding the sequence is the fastest way to tell an engineered floor from a rolled-on coating with sprinkles in it.
Maverick is the manufacturer as well as the installer, so the mortar, the aggregate, the pigment, and the topcoat all come from one accountable company — and the finished floor carries a 2-year single-source warranty covering materials and labor.
Base, Broadcast, Topcoat
- 1. The body goes down wet. After the slab is mechanically prepared and primed, a self-leveling mortar — urethane cement for thermal shock and washdown, epoxy cement where the chemistry allows — is placed at roughly 3/16″. It has to still be open when the aggregate hits it.
- 2. Broadcast to rejection. Colored quartz or vinyl flake is thrown into the wet body until the surface will not accept another grain — roughly 0.75 lb/sq.ft. Broadcasting to rejection is what builds the wearing course and the slip profile in one pass. A light, decorative scatter does neither.
- 3. Cure, scrape, vacuum, seal. The excess is knocked back and vacuumed off, then a MavSeal UPA polyaspartic topcoat at 12–16 mils locks the broadcast down and sets the final texture, gloss, and chemical resistance.
- Total build: ¼″. Body plus broadcast reaches a full quarter inch of engineered wear surface — not a film that a pallet jack peels back in a season.
Quartz or Flake — and When Each One Fits
Same broadcast principle, different aggregate, genuinely different floors. The specification hinges on what the room does to the surface, not on which sample board looks better in the conference room. Full build-ups and shop drawings live on the MavTop broadcast systems page.
| Consideration | Colored Quartz | Vinyl Flake |
|---|---|---|
| What it is | Graded, kiln-fired, pigment-coated silica sand | Thin colored polymer chip, blended to a pattern |
| Texture | Aggressive and adjustable — the safety choice for wet floors | Lower profile, easier underfoot and easier to mop |
| Look | Uniform granite-like field; color from the quartz blend | Terrazzo-like pattern; strongest wear concealment |
| Best fit | Processing, dish areas, wet rooms, chemical service, heavy wheel traffic | Kitchens front-of-house, healthcare, locker and shower rooms, corridors, garages |
| Maverick system | MavTop UQB / UQ-HD (urethane cement), EQ-HD (epoxy cement) | MavTop UF-HD (urethane cement), EFB (epoxy cement) |
The second decision is the mortar chemistry underneath. Urethane cement takes steam, hot CIP, and freezer-to-dock swings without delaminating, and tolerates moisture vapor transmission up to 20 lbs./1,000 sq.ft. in 24 hours — see MavCrete urethane cement. Epoxy cement is the right, more economical call for dry-process, packaging, and ambient-temperature areas where thermal shock is not part of the job — see the MavCoat epoxy build-ups.
Texture Is a Setting, Not an Accident
A broadcast floor delivers a wet dynamic coefficient of friction above 0.63 under ANSI A326.3 — but the number is only half the answer. How much the topcoat fills the aggregate profile decides whether the floor grips like a dish pit or mops like a corridor, and that fill is a decision we make zone by zone with you before the first pail opens.
Too aggressive and housekeeping can't get it clean, so soil builds in the profile and the floor gets slicker over time. Too smooth and you have a hazard the day it gets wet. The right answer changes at the door between the cook line and the dining room, and a competent installer treats that as two different fills on one continuous floor.
Why It Cleans
- Seamless and coved. Integral cove base carries the floor up the wall with no joint for soil or bacteria to live in — the detail that makes broadcast floors the replacement for failing quarry tile and grout.
- Non-porous under the texture. The polyaspartic topcoat closes the surface, so what looks like texture is not a sponge. Formulated to support food-safety compliance programs in inspected facilities.
- Sloped to drain where it matters. Pitch is built into the system, not hoped for from the original slab, so water leaves the floor instead of standing in it.
- Abrasion and impact rated. 30 mg loss on a CS-17 wheel at 1,000 cycles (ASTM D4060) and impact strength above 160 in./lbs. (ASTM D4226) — the texture survives the scrubber and the dropped pan alike.
The Numbers Buyers Actually Ask About
Typical MavTop UQB values from the system guide, on fully cured material. Project values are confirmed against the current system guide before we quote — the full property and chemical-resistance tables are on the MavTop systems page.
| Property | Test Method | Typical Value |
|---|---|---|
| Wet dynamic COF | ANSI A326.3 | > 0.63 |
| Compressive strength | ASTM C579 | 8,300 psi |
| Bond strength | ASTM D7234 | 100% concrete failure |
| Abrasion, CS-17 wheel, 1,000 cycles | ASTM D4060 | 30 mg loss |
| Moisture vapor tolerance | ASTM F1869 | Up to 20 lbs./1,000 sq.ft./24 hrs |
| UV gloss retention, 1,000 hrs QUV | ASTM G154 | 87–89 |
| Return to service, foot traffic | — | 6–8 hours |
One System, Many Rooms
The reason broadcast is the most-specified decorative industrial finish is range: the same three-step build serves a wet processing room and a public corridor by changing aggregate, color, and topcoat fill.
Commercial Kitchens
Seamless coved quartz broadcast replaces failing quarry tile and grout — aggressive texture at the dish pit, a mopable fill out front, installed overnight so service is not interrupted.
View the ServiceHealthcare & Labs
Flake broadcast gives clinical corridors, soiled utility, and lab space a seamless, non-porous surface that hides scuffs and cart wear instead of showing every one of them.
View the IndustryLocker & Shower Rooms
Wet barefoot traffic is the hardest slip case there is. A flake broadcast with the texture tuned for bare feet, coved at the walls and pitched to the drains, is the system that answers it.
View the SystemPlants, Docks & Garages
Fleet bays, municipal and multi-bay garages, and plant aisles get a quartz broadcast for wheel-load abrasion and hot-tire resistance — wear and future repairs disappear into the aggregate field.
View the ServiceGarage Floors
A flake broadcast is the standard garage finish — the chip field hides tire marks and salt staining, and a polyaspartic topcoat holds its color at the overhead door where sunlight would amber an epoxy.
View the ServiceA flake garage floor is the same chemistry at a different scale. Maverick installs garage floor coatings with its own crews, and for do-it-yourself projects the flake kits are sold through the Maverick eSupply shop. Color blends for either route are on the color charts.
Michigan, Ohio & the Midwest
From our Farmington Hills shop we run broadcast crews across Metro Detroit, Grand Rapids, Lansing, Ann Arbor, and Flint, and throughout Ohio — Toledo, Cleveland, and Columbus. Because we manufacture the material, phased and overnight work in food & beverage facilities, commercial kitchens, and manufacturing plants is scheduled around your operation, not around a supplier's lead time.
- Food & Beverage Processing
- Commercial Kitchens
- Healthcare & Labs
- Locker & Shower Rooms
- Breweries & Distilleries
- Fleet & Service Garages
Straight Answers Before You Call
What is the difference between a quartz floor and a flake floor?
Both are broadcast systems — the difference is the aggregate. Colored quartz is a hard, graded sand that builds a thicker, more abrasive wearing course, so it is the choice for wet processing, dish areas, and anywhere hard wheels and sanitation chemicals are the daily load. Vinyl flake is a thin chip that lies flatter and reads as a terrazzo-like pattern, so it is the choice where appearance leads and the exposure is traffic and cleaning rather than thermal shock. Quartz carries more texture and more wear; flake hides scuffs and dirt better in a corridor. We match the aggregate to the exposure, not to a catalog page.
How slip resistant is a broadcast floor?
A quartz or flake broadcast delivers a wet dynamic coefficient of friction above 0.63 under ANSI A326.3, and the exact texture is tuned by how much the topcoat fills the aggregate profile. That is a system decision, not a product decision — a dish pit and a hospital corridor should not get the same fill, because the aggressive texture that keeps a wet kitchen safe is the same texture that makes a mop drag in a lobby. We set the fill zone by zone.
Does a broadcast floor hide wear better than a smooth coating?
Yes, and that is a large part of why buyers choose it. A smooth self-leveling floor shows every scratch, tire mark, and patch because there is no visual noise to absorb it. A broadcast floor is a field of thousands of colored quartz grains or flake chips, so scuffs, minor abrasion, and future repairs disappear into the pattern instead of standing out. The surface also carries real abrasion resistance behind the looks — 30 mg loss on a CS-17 wheel at 1,000 cycles under ASTM D4060.
Can a broadcast floor go over a damp or green slab?
Often, yes. Urethane-cement MavTop builds tolerate moisture vapor transmission up to 20 lbs./1,000 sq.ft. in 24 hours under ASTM F1869, which is why they are the standard answer on slabs that would blister an ordinary epoxy. We test the slab before we quote it. Where the reading is higher or the substrate is on grade without a vapor retarder, a MavPrime moisture mitigation layer goes in first — either way the moisture question is answered before material ships, not after the floor bubbles.
Pick the Look. We'll Engineer the Floor.
Send us the room, the square footage, the washdown regime, and what the floor has to survive. We'll recommend the MavTop build-up, the aggregate, and the texture fill — and a Maverick engineer will respond within 48 hours.